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WOWCH is a Brooklyn based design company specializing in conceptual t-shirts that landed on this planet in late 2003. Wowch graphics put a sardonic spin on sweet furry things and twist nature into a cartoonish nightmare. With only 4 seasons under their belts and little support from the mainstream press, they've gained quite a large underground following all around the world. Already stocked in dozens of prestigious stores all around the USA and Japan, by the middle of 2006 WOWCH will be stocked in Paris, Barcelona, Melbourne, Milan, and Stockholm as well.

When not working on their line, the two artists, Max Cattaneo and Matt Shankman, have had the pleasure of designing exclusive graphics for cool rock bands such as The Rapture, Beck, Tenacious D, Outhud, Vhs or Beta, and DFA Records to name a few. The duo have also set their mark on the art world with their show entitled 'WOWCH you talkin' 'bout?' Their colorful mix of paintings, posters and one-of-a-kind shirt designs debuted on July 8th 2005 this past summer at the 222 Gallery in Los Angeles, CA. They've also recently had some exclusive work showcased in ARKITIP Magazine and CATHOLIC 'zine hardback edition (evil twin publications). And on top of all that, their frequent New York City parties have become an institution amongst the beautiful, the boisterous, and the buffoons.
Q1 What is the concept of your brand?
We make clothes that we can't afford! No seriously ... there's a fine line between whats hip and whats tacky. We want hip & tacky to fall in love.

Q2 Could you tell us about the projects that you are working on right now?
Currently we are just launching WOWCH at our new showroom Iheart. The lovely ladies of Iheart, Jill and Toni have had their store in the Nolita section of NYC for the past two and a half years and it's located on 262 Mott St. They have kindly let us create a WOWCH WORLD in the back, we did a painting, added some brica brac, funny masks, and don't forget the lovely shirts.
 
Stop in and say hello if your in town! Their store is hands down the best in the city. We are also working on a project that will allow us to travel and promote WOWCH in Japan.

Q3 Why did you become designer?
I would say it's kind of a fluke that we became designers. We got some iron ons from a nice old lady at a flea market in Ohio, and our friend gave us an iron on press. Then we started cutting them up and making bizzarro combinations. Soon our friends wanted some and we both ended up living in NYC. We made some samples and took them
to a showroom. Then Fred Segal placed an order and it kinda snowballed from there.And we wanted to pick up girls with the line, "yeah I'm a designer".

Q4 When do you usually get the inspiration for your works?
I usually get inspired when i see some truly horrendous graphic design, cos that shit is everywhere. I'm always throwing magazines across the room when I see bad stuff. I blame LA culture, and cocaine. Seriously, don't fuckin use coke and photoshop at the same time under any circumstance.

Q5 Could you tell us the process of working on your pieces?
Since we use heat transfers, its just a lot of cutting & tracing.
 
 
 
 

Very menial boring stuff we do in front of the tv, and then of course we have our 2 heat presses for the actual transferring process. It's a regular baby sweatshop here.

Q6 What do you fell important when you are working on your pieces?
Would our friends like this design, cut, and feel of the shirt? Are we getting better and thinking of awesomer pieces for us to lay the WOWCH down on?

Q7 Are you guys married?
We're engaged to get engaged.

Q8 What do you think about the current fashion trend?
There are always going to be a portion of any fashion trend that we like. Most of the best can be found in Japan. But truthfully silkscreening is just too easy to do, so you'll get every kid with an art degree working in their basement pumping out some of the most horrific designs ever. Hopefully that fad will soon come to an end because it's really over-saturating the market.

Q9 Could you tell us the work you enjoyed?
We really appreciate the iconography of Iron Maiden's EDDIE throughout the years. That dude's taken on a lot of sweet forms. Surf wear like Maui & Sons and RonJon had a cool, vibrant run for awhile.
 

I kinda get in trouble a lot cos I openly admit I enjoy Taz clothing. I wouldn't wear it, but I always dig seeing it. Anything with pot leaves on it tends to get our attention for some weird reason.

Q10 What do you do on your day off?
Everyday is a day off around here lately. Answering these questions is considered work. Well its summertime here so going to the beach is always a plus. People kinda forget that New York City is only 45 minutes away from the ocean.
The last awesome day off I recall we caught a NY METS baseball day game out in Queens and afterwords we discovered a killer miniature golf course in Flushing Meadows park right next to where they have that big US OPEN tennis
tournament. Did I mention they served beer at the course?

Q11 Are there any places or countries you would like to visit?
Well Japan is our #1, Australia is a close 2nd, Then perhaps a European vacation. Visiting all the stores that carry WOWCH would be a sweet dream come true.Then a nice beach to relax on to drink light beers and look at girls in bikinis.

Q12 Have you been you Japan?
NOT YET. We are working on it, hopefully fall of 2006. Keep your fingers and eyes crossed till then for us. THANKS!

Q13 What is your favorite cuisine? Could you tell us your favorite restaurants?
Oh, snap we could write a whole book on this one, entitled 'Hey Lardass: HOW TO GET REALLY FAT IN NEW YORK CITY.' Every good list should start with pizza. We'll eat any pizza, from that shitty frozen 2 for a dollar pizza to
Lombardi's. All time favorite pizza is at a chain in Ohio called DONATO's where they guarantee 100 pieces of pepperoni per pizza. It's a must. Buffalo Wings are wonderful sloppy treat. Sushi is topnotch too. Due to competition there's a ton of half-price sushi restaurants in the East Village. Some people are snobby about that kinda stuff but not us. We're men of the people. Did I mention burgers?

Q14 Could you tell us anything what you think its cool at the moment?
I'm just gonna kind of do a laundry list.. Ulrich Roth era Scorpions, Guitar Hero + Drugs, certain NYC bars/parties that have free drinks, TV Carnage, Wonder Showzen, old Miami Vice, drum pad machines, playing softball and soccer, coors light, girls in bikinis, clowns, Black Sabbath, The Onion, and Dave Sanders.

Q15 Are there any people who inspired you? Who do you respect?
DAVE SANDER #1 coolest dude in NYC.
 

He has a zine called FUCK THIS LIFE where he collages womens faces from porno mags along with evil local crime and murder reports from the newspaper. Its available at the aNYthing store in the Lower East Side along with a limited edition tshirt. The guy knows everything about every fashion line out there - high end, street wear,vintage, etc. He's a bloodhound for finding drugs on the floor at any bar or party, and when he crashes on our couch he always cleans up after himself unlike most guests. He does the Street Report on my radio show PIZZA PARTY where he makes fun of how people are dressed walking around the east village. You can podcast it at www.eastvillageradio.com

Q16 Favorite word or phrase
Whoa Nelly, Arevaderci cock sucker, Bring on the Bitches, Oink Oink my good man, WE LOVE YOU!, HOLY DIVER, you wanna get some beer?, WEIRRRRRRD, You're Fired!

Q17 What is your favorite music?
Tons of stuff - NWOBHM, italo, AM GOLD, Yacht Rock, bubblegum... Wow like I said before you can podcast my radio show to get the idea----copy this link and paste it into your iTunes - http://www.eastvillageradio.com/auto- archives/Max_+_Kevin/dircaster.php
or wait I also have a new radio show at WWW.VIVA-RADIO.COM called Burgertime.
There's always an archive of the last months show available for streaming.

Q18 What is your goal?
Oh man... the goal is to keep being successful at doing what makes us happy. It ain't rocket science. We make decent money but we could always do better. ...we gotta spread out... conquer some more countries... diversify our product and so on... It'd be real nice to do one of those collaborations with adidas or converse that some of the topflight designer/artists get to do. A guy can dream...

Q19 Any massage?
WOWCH LIFESTYLE RULES - CASE CLOSED. If you don't got it by now you will never get it. Why be normal? WEAR WOWCH!

 
 
WOWCH


http://www.wowch.com
 
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